Governor: "We are in dire circumstances"

On Saturday, Governor David Paterson urged lawmakers, especially Senate Republicans, to do something about the state's budget deficit, which the governor has pegged at $3.2 billion through the rest of this year.  He says state Comptroller Thomas DiNapoli has pointed out another thirteen or fourteen billion dollars in state obligations will come due in March.

"We are in dire circumstances," Paterson told reporters.

The governor said he thinks both parties in the Assembly recognize the seriousness of the crisis and suggested Senate Republicans are reluctant to go public with budget cuts they would make for fear of facing reprisals from voters.

"They estimate revenues that don't exist and they ovestimate what we could receive from areas such as Medicaid fraud recovery - I think it's irresponsible," Paterson said. As for the Senate Democrats, the governor says his guess is they "hesitate in putting out a plan because they don't want to be attacked for even addressing a dime of school aid cuts, so this is the - basically fiddling while Rome is burning, this is what's actually happening here."

Senate Minority Leader Dean Skelos responded with a news release saying "Senate Republicans have repeatedly asked Governor Paterson to send us his deficit reduction bill to act on, yet he has refused to do so. Governor, send us your bill. Enough with the hysterics."

Paterson: "Take note, Senators: This is not a cash-flow problem, this is a cash problem."

"When you look at the avoidant behavior and the almost denial that many of the legislators seem to be in," says the governor, "you recognse that they have let their political issue usurp doing what's right for the people of New York."

Paterson said he spent part of Saturday in a conference call with the comptroller and some of his own highest-level advisors discussing the deficit.  Last week he addressed a rare joint session of the Assembly and called a special session to address the budget but it produced no real solution.